


Customary

by elirwen



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Fluff, Forced Bonding, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-09-03 17:27:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8722558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elirwen/pseuds/elirwen
Summary: As crown prince of Camelot, Arthur is forced to accept his first magical slave, even if he detests the custom.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Polomonkey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Polomonkey/gifts).



> I didn't really follow any of the prompts I was given, but I hope it still works for you. :)
> 
>  
> 
> Additional warnings are in the end notes.

“What were you thinking?” Arthur asks, seething, once they're behind the closed door of his chambers. 

“He was hurting that serving girl,” Merlin says. “I couldn't just stand by and do nothing.”

“That's exactly what you should have done.”

“But...” Merlin begins.

“Enough,” Arthur yells, banging his fist on the table.

For once Merlin obeys, silence spreading through the room. Arthur leans on the table, taking a deep breath to control his anger. He turns around to face Merlin and finds him kneeling on the floor, his hands clasped behind his back, gaze turned down. 

Feeling of wrongness spreads through his body as he's reminded of the first time he saw Merlin, the day his father forced him to accept his first slave.

 

*

_  
“I told you I don't want one,” Arthur says, keeping his voice low, glaring at his father._

_“You're a crown prince of Camelot now. Tradition demands you receive your personal magical.”_

_“But...”_

_“Enough. You will do as I say,” Uther raises his voice, effectively ending the discussion._

_All the while, the sorcerer is kneeling on the floor, his hands tied behind his back, two guards standing right behind him. He keeps his gaze glued to the floor, his shoulders stiff, lips pressed into tight line. His breathing is slightly irregular as he tries to appear calm, but his body betrays him from time to time, forcing him to take in an extra breath. He's trembling almost imperceptibly. If Arthur didn't know what to look for, he wouldn't notice any of that, but he is trained in the arts of reading people, knowing there's fear coursing through the veins of the man before him._

_In that moment, Arthur makes a decision. If he's forced to become the sorcerer's master, he will do his best to give the man as much freedom as he'll be able._

_“Give me the bindings,” he orders._

_A servant scurries from the side of the hall, presenting him with a set of two bracelets and a collar. They're silver, carved with ancient runes all over their surface. He accepts the sharp knife his father is handing him and cuts his palm, not very deep but deep enough for blood to immediately well up in the wound. He lets the blood drip over each piece of the bindings, the runes flashing as the blood makes contact and seeps into the metal, leaving the surface spotless._

_He's handed a strip of clean cloth to wrap around his palm before he approaches the sorcerer. The guards untie the man's hands, forcing him to lift them in front of him. Arthur clasps each bracelet around the man's wrist, the runes flashing again. The guards let go of the sorcerer's hands and one of them forces his head up, giving Arthur access to his neck. For a split second their eyes meet before the man averts his gaze again. Even that short moment confirms Arthur's guess, fear and humiliation evident in the man's eyes. He clasps the collar around his neck, all three bindings glowing this time. The man cries out, hunching on himself and nearly falling to the floor if it wasn't for the guards gripping his shoulders. Even Arthur feels his legs go slightly weak along with a strange moment of lightheadedness as the bond settles._

_“Remove the suppressors,” Uther commands._

_“No,” Arthur counters. “I'll do it myself. In my chambers.”_

_He knows how painful the rush of returning magic is for the sorcerers, even if the returning magic is no longer completely theirs to command. He doesn't want to further humiliate the man in front of four more men._

_“Arthur,” Uther starts, but he doesn't let him finish._

_“He is mine now. It's my decision to make,” Arthur says. “What's your name?” he addresses the man without waiting for his father's reaction._

_The sorcerer doesn't answer, back to staring at the floor._

_“Answer,” the guard grunts, shaking him by his shoulder._

_“What's your name?” Arthur asks again when it's apparent the man has no idea what the question was._

_“Merlin,” he says, his voice hoarse from disuse._

_“Sire,” the guard hisses the reminder, squeezing Merlin's shoulder hard enough to elicit a yelp of pain from him before he clamps his mouth shut, swallowing any other sounds._

_“I'm sorry, Sire,” Merlin says eventually, breathless with pain._

_The guard's grip isn't hard enough to hurt this much. He'll have to check Merlin for any injuries once they're alone. He glares at the guard anyway and motions for him to help Merlin stand._

_“Follow me then,” Arthur says, nods to his father and turns to leave the council chambers.  
_

*

 

“Get up for goodness sake,” Arthur says, unable to stand the sight. 

Merlin does as he's told, but his gaze remains fixed on the floor, his hands behind his back. His chest is heaving with emotion, his whole body tense.

“Stop it,” Arthur says. “Just...”

He takes a deep breath, knowing he won't help matters if he yells at Merlin now, but he doesn't know how to approach him. It took Arthur almost six month after their first meeting to convince Merlin to start believing Arthur might consider him an equal. More long months he spent working on drawing out Merlin's personality. He enjoys the moments Merlin opposes him, calls him names, talks without being prompted. He cherishes every laugh, joke, piece of castle gossip shared in the privacy of his chambers, every remark, both insightful or cheeky, whispered to him during the long and tedious council sessions. He's afraid he might have ruined at least part of their progress, if not most of it, with this outburst. 

“Take off your shirt and lie down on the bed,” he orders, deciding he needs to take care of Merlin's injured back first. 

Merlin looks up at him, shock evident on his face, but turns to do as he's told immediately. It only makes Arthur more mad at himself. 

 

*

_  
“I need you to know I am firmly against this custom,” Arthur says once the guard leaves the room._

_Merlin stands stock still in the middle of the chambers, hands clasped behind his back like he's been taught._

_“I will not hurt you. I will not use you for my pleasure,” Arthur says. “The court might see you as my property, but if you are to be something of mine then you will be my responsibility, mine to protect and care for.”_

_“Thank you, Sire,” Merlin says, but it sounds dull, a learned phrase._

_“Show me where you're hurt,” Arthur says, not needing to ask if he is hurt, not after what he saw earlier._

_“I'm fine,” Merlin says._

_Arthur sighs. It's going to be much harder than he imagined. He steps closer to Merlin, taking advantage of Merlin's conditioning which doesn't allow him to move without being told to. He starts a gentle palpation of his body, from his left shoulder down the left side of his chest to his stomach and back up along the right side again. He watches Merlin for any sign of pain or discomfort, but apart from minor twinges, he gets nothing. He circles him and starts the process again on his back and this time he gets a reaction in form of sharp intakes of breath and hisses of pain almost anywhere he touches._

_“Take off your shirt,” he says and Merlin obeys, albeit a bit reluctantly._

_It's Arthur's turn to suck in a breath, but from surprise, not pain. Merlin's back is covered in bruises of all colours, several fresh welts prominent on the otherwise smooth skin. Arthur's gaze travels along the sharp lines of Merlin's shoulder blades and ribcage, adding starvation to the list of all the horrors Merlin must have lived through._

_He tugs Merlin towards the bed, coaxing him to lie down on his front. He spreads healing salve over each patch of injured skin, hoping the silent tears sliding down Merlin's cheeks come at least partially from relief, not just from pain Arthur's care must be causing him._

_“Don't move just yet,” Arthur says when he's done, covering Merlin's back with a light blanket._

_He goes to his door, instructing the guard stationed just outside to fetch a servant who'd get him his dinner, emphasizing he's very hungry so he expects the meal to reflect it._

_When he comes back to bed, he finds Merlin asleep, his whole body lax for the first time that day.  
_

*

 

Merlin pauses by the bed, his hands hovering over the hem of his shirt for a short moment before he proceeds to pull it over his head. He folds it carefully, setting it on the chair near the bed, something Arthur doubts he'd do any other day. Even from the distance Arthur can see the angry red welts from where the visiting noble hit him with the riding crop. He crosses the room to fetch the healing salve from one of the cupboards only to be granted another shock when turning back around. 

“What are you doing?” he asks, watching Merlin unfastening his trousers.

“I thought...” Merlin trails off. “I don't need to be coddled,” he says a moment later, a bit of the true Merlin shining through. “They didn't fuck me because they knew they'd get paid better for a virgin, but they did enough to show me the ropes.”

Arthur knows of Merlin's virginity. His father didn't hesitate to inform him about it during lunch the day after Arthur was forced to accept Merlin as his slave. He remembers losing his appetite and heading out to train his knights, making even the best trained of them pant with exhaustion by the end of their session.

He made himself clear that he would never require Merlin to warm his bed. They have never even shared a bed apart from Merlin's first night as Arthur's magical. Arthur arranged for a bed to be brought to a small room adjacent to his chambers the very next day, and that's where Merlin has been staying ever since.

Learning that Merlin was subjected to yet another humiliating and violating practice makes Arthur feel sick. He has been convincing himself Merlin's captors left at least a small part of his self untouched, never asking about the topic. Inadvertently, he helped Merlin's trauma fester in his mind.

He might be doing everything in his power to show Merlin he doesn't consider him his slave, but it doesn't change the fact he is still bound to him, his magic a captive, forced out of him only by Arthur's command or when Arthur is in danger and the bindings allow Merlin to act. But even then the choice isn't completely his. The bindings cause physical pain if magicals don't use their power to help their master. 

It also doesn't change that Arthur's feelings for Merlin has been growing for months now, feelings of more than friendship, and while he tries to not let them show, sometimes he just can't help letting his gaze linger on Merlin as he goes about his daily duties. It's hard to be in control every waking minute of the day.

It's possible Merlin picked up on this. Maybe he's been waiting for Arthur to go back on his word for quite some time now. 

“I promised never to take advantage of you in any way,” Arthur says, not moving from where he stands. “Not if it can be helped,” he adds, recalling the number of times Merlin's magic saved his life. “I can take you to Gaius if you don't want me to see to your back.”

Merlin's eyes flicker to the jar of salve in Arthur's hand and he bites his lip, his blank expression turning into a bashful one. Arthur feels mortification rise within him when he puts two and two together and realizes Merlin knows the contents of his cupboards better than anyone as he is the one to return the vial of oil to its proper place in the mornings when Arthur doesn't muster the energy to do it after pleasuring himself at night. The vial of oil that rests on the same shelf as the salve.

Merlin lets go of the fastening of his trousers then and lies down on the bed, giving his silent consent for Arthur to take care of him.

 

*

_  
Arthur lets Merlin sleep while he goes over the reports to prepare himself for their next council session. When Merlin awakes an hour or two later, Arthur lends him one of his old tunics and makes sure he eats. Every time Merlin reaches for a piece of food, he does so reluctantly, as if expecting it to be taken away from him by force and punishment be granted instead._

_There's one more matter they need to deal with before Merlin can be seen with him outside his chambers. The suppressors._

_Arthur has seen both fastening and removing the suppressors at least a dozen times. The victims always suffer. When suppressing the magic, most sorcerers collapse, losing control of their bodies as such a significant part of who they are is cut off from them. Some fall straight into unconsciousness._

_Removing the clasps tends to be more painful. Instead of numbness and fainting, the sorcerers face the rush of returning magic which tears through them once finally free to settle back under their skin. Seizures and violent cramps aren't uncommon._

_“I need to take them off,” Arthur says eventually._

_Merlin offers him his wrists without a word._

_“Not like this. Bed will be safer,” Arthur says, guiding Merlin towards it for the second time that day. “How bad was it when they put them on?” he asks once Merlin is lying on his back in the middle of the mattress._

_“I couldn't breathe,” Merlin says, staring straight ahead at the canopy. “I soiled myself,” he admits, voice wavering with embarrassment._

_Arthur doesn't doubt the slave masters punished him severely for something he had no way of controlling, and that must be why Merlin is telling him now. He must be hoping that the punishment won't be as hard if he tells Arthur beforehand were it to happen again._

_“It's nothing unusual,” Arthur assures him. “Did you pass out afterwards?”_

_“Yes,” Merlin says. “Sire,” he adds hastily._

_For those who lose consciousness entirely after having their magic taken away, removing the suppressors usually leads to much stronger reaction. Seeing the signs of fear building up in Merlin's body, Arthur knows Merlin is aware of that. Waiting will only make things worse now._

_He reaches for the keys to the suppressors, unlocking the clasp on Merlin's left wrist. Merlin cries out, snatching the hand to his chest, trying to roll onto his side to curl around it, but Arthur can't let him. Every delay means less of Merlin's energy left to deal with the final clasp being removed._

_Arthur unlocks the clasp on Merlin's other wrist, another sharp cry leaving Merlin's lips. He's forced to climb on top of Merlin to steady him enough to work on unlocking the collar. When it falls free, Merlin's body stills for a second before it convulses hard several times. Merlin's mouth is open in a silent scream. His voice returns when the major cramps pass, giving way to full body shivers. Short pained moans fall from his lips and Arthur pulls him into a hug without thinking, one hand buried in Merlin's hair, the other on his lower back, holding him until he feels the shivers finally subside._

_“I'll keep you safe,” he says feeling Merlin grow heavy in his arms, exhaustion dragging him to sleep for the second time that day.  
_

*

 

Arthur has to swallow around a lump in his throat as he starts working the salve into the skin of Merlin's back. Even if it's been more than a year since he cared for similar wounds marring Merlin's skin, he still remembers it as clear as day. Merlin of the past, subdued, broken, hurt, still haunts his nightmares. 

“I can't stand seeing you hurt,” he says, allowing his feeling to bubble to the surface for once. “That's why I will always shout at you for doing something ridiculously brave.”

“It's not that bad,” Merlin says, hissing as Arthur touches particularly tender spot. 

“He would have beaten you to death if Leon didn't show up,” Arthur says, his hands moving over the healthy skin now. No medical necessity, just offering comfort. 

“I can take care of myself,” Merlin says.

“He's my father's guest. Any harm you'd cause him would mean punishment for you.”

“I'd do it again if needed,” Merlin says and Arthur can't even be mad at him.

In moments like these his feelings for Merlin grow the fastest, even now he feels the dull ache of yearning settle in his stomach as he wants nothing more than wrap himself around this stupid, infuriating, brave man. But he can't do that. He has no right. 

“I know,” he says instead, pulling his hands away from Merlin's warmth, letting them rest in his lap.

Silence spreads and Arthur thinks Merlin has fallen asleep, but he starts rising from his lying position after a while.

“You should rest,” Arthur says, but Merlin doesn't listen, moving to kneel next to him instead. 

He watches Arthur for a while, still without a word, and Arthur would escape his gaze if he didn't feel so tired right now. 

“I wish I could give you full freedom right now, not just promising to do so once I'm king,” Arthur says, looking at Merlin. “But they would hunt you down. They would make me watch you burn to death,” he says, his throat suddenly tight.

Arthur doesn't fight it when Merlin leans in to press their lips together. He doesn't fight it when Merlin climbs onto his lap and deepens the kiss. He wants to give himself a few moments to enjoy and remember before telling Merlin to stop, before assuring Merlin he doesn't owe him anything. But Merlin seems to have different plans as he pulls away, caressing Arthur's face with both his hands.

“I might not have chosen you when I was given to you, but I am choosing you now,” he says, pressing another chaste kiss to Arthur's lips. 

“You don't have to do this,” Arthur says, this time being the one not allowing himself to believe.

“I've been choosing you for months,” Merlin says, smiling at him softly. “The binding never forced me to protect you.”

Hope and happiness spreads through Arthur's chest, and he lets Merlin wrap him into a tight hug, allows the tears of relief and joy to flow.

“I'll keep you safe,” Merlin says.

Arthur feels their forced bond shift and change, turn into something bright that sinks deeper into his soul. He feels Merlin tightening his arms around him with a barely audible gasp, sees a flash of bright light even through his closed eyelids.

He knows the silver bands around Merlin's wrists and neck are nothing more than jewelery now.

He doesn't need the confirmation in the form of Merlin's joyful laugh and dozens of butterflies fluttering around them, creation of Merlin's magic, Arthur's command unnecessary. 

All he needs is to feel the comforting warmth of the true bond tingling under his skin.

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: mentions of past abuse and noncon stuff


End file.
